Atlanta, GA (BlackNews.com) — What is Black History anyway? Should it focus primarily on the Black experience in the United States, from the beginning of slavery up to the Civil Rights movement? Is that all there is to know? If not, how far back in time does â€œBlack historyâ€ go? And how much of our world should be included in this story?

These two questions provided the direction for a groundbreaking new book titled When the World Was Black: The Untold History of the Worldâ€™s First Civilizations set to release this month, February 2013. In When the World was Black, author Supreme Understanding explores over 200,000 years of history, scouring the entire globe for the important roles played by Black people in founding the worldâ€™s oldest cultures and civilizations. Despite his unconventional name, Supreme Understanding is a credible scholar. After completing studies in History at Morehouse College, he completed a doctorate in education, specifically focusing on how best to develop curriculum for at-risk youth. After post-graduate studies spanning five continents, he set out to develop a new model for the study of Black History.

The resulting product was When the World was Black, a two-volume text spanning over 900 pages. Together, the two volumes cover over 200,000 years of Black history, and over 100 countries. â€œThis is heavy stuff, so I wanted to make sure it would be easy enough for a high school student to read and enjoy,â€ Understanding says. “So I drew on my experience writing curriculum to make these books reader-friendly, even for people who donâ€™t like reading about anything, much less about history.” He notes that, for many young adults, history seems “boring” or “irrelevant.”

To combat these notions, When the World was Black couples over 1,000 endnotes with over 200 photographs and maps, many of them in full-color. Readers will also encounter liberal doses of humor, plenty of explanations in layman’s terms, as well as discussions of the modern-day consequences of past events. The book has already attracted the attention of scholars, like renowned historian Runoko Rashidi, who wrote the bookâ€™s foreword.

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